Women in the United States Senate

There have been 44 women in the United States Senate since the establishment of that body in 1789. The first woman senator, Rebecca Felton, served in 1922 (for a single day), but the first woman elected to the Senate was Hattie Caraway in 1932. Fourteen of the women who have served were appointed; seven of those were appointed to succeed their deceased husbands. Currently, the 114th Congress has 20 female senators, the same number as in the 113th Congress.

History

The five women elected to the Senate in 1992, the "Year of the Woman"

By the 111th Congress (2009-2011), the number of women senators had increased to 17, including four Republicans and 13 Democrats.

Throughout most of the Senate's history, that legislative chamber has been almost entirely male. Until 1920, few women ran for the Senate. Until the 1990s, very few were elected. This paucity of women was due to many factors, including the lack of women's suffrage in many states until ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, women's limited access to higher education until the mid-1900s, public perceptions of gender roles, and barriers to women's advancement such as sex discrimination, which still plays a factor in their limited numbers today.

The first woman in the Senate was Rebecca Latimer Felton who served for only one day in 1922. Hattie Caraway of Arkansas became the first woman to win election to the Senate, in 1932. No women served from 1922 to 1931, 1945 to 1947, and 1973 to 1978. Since 1978, there has always been at least one woman in the Senate.

There were still few women in the Senate near the end of the 20th century, long after women began to make up a significant portion of the membership of the House. In fact, the first time there were three women in the Senate simultaneously was in 1992, when Jocelyn Burdick of North Dakota, joined Nancy Kassebaum of Kansas and Barbara Mikulski of Maryland. The number increased to four in November, when Dianne Feinstein won a special election in California.

This trend began to change in the wake of the Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination hearings, and the subsequent election of the 103rd Congress in 1992, which was dubbed the "Year of the Woman." In addition to Mikulski, who was reelected that year, four women were elected to the Senate, all Democrats. They were Patty Murray of Washington, Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois, and Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, both of California. In June 1993, Kay Bailey Hutchison won a special election in Texas, and joined Kassebaum as a fellow female Republican senator. These additions significantly diminished the popular perception of the Senate as an exclusive "boys' club."

Since then, many more women in both the Democratic and Republican parties have campaigned for the Senate, and several have been elected. Of the 31 women who have ever been elected 20 are currently serving in the 114th Congress (2015-2016).

Cumulatively, 29 female senators have been Democrats, while 17 have been Republicans. Of the 20 female senators now serving, 14 are Democrats and 6 are Republicans.

Women senators for the 114th Congress

In January 2013, the number of serving women senators increased to 20: 16 Democrats and 4 Republicans. Republican Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison (Texas) and Olympia Snowe (Maine) did not seek re-election in 2012, while five new women senators were elected: Republican Deb Fischer (Nebraska) and Democrats Tammy Baldwin (Wisconsin), Heidi Heitkamp (North Dakota), Mazie Hirono (Hawaii) and Elizabeth Warren (Massachusetts). In the 2014 election the total number of women in the Senate remained at 20, but the partisan makeup changed, as Democratic Senators Kay Hagan (North Carolina) and Mary Landrieu (Louisiana) were defeated for re-election while Republicans Shelley Moore Capito (West Virginia) and Joni Ernst (Iowa) were newly elected.

For three states, California, Washington, and New Hampshire, both senators are women. California's two senators (Boxer and Feinstein) were the first two women to be elected to the U.S. Senate in the same election (in 1992) from the same state. Ten female senators had previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives - a distinction long held by only Margaret Chase Smith - Sens. Mikulski, Boxer, Snowe, Lincoln, Stabenow, Cantwell, Gillibrand, Baldwin, Hirono and Moore Capito.

Class	State	Name	Party	Prior Experience	First took office	Born
3	Alaska	Lisa Murkowski	Republican	Alaska House of Representatives	2002	1957
1	California	Dianne Feinstein	Democrat	President of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Mayor of San Francisco	1992	1933
3	California	Barbara Boxer	Democrat	Marin County Board of Supervisors, U.S. House of Representatives	1993	1940
1	Hawaii	Mazie Hirono	Democrat	U.S. House of Representatives, Lieutenant Governor of Hawaii, Hawaii House of Representatives	2013	1947
2	Iowa	Joni Ernst	Republican	Montgomery County Auditor; Iowa Senate	2015	1970
2	Maine	Susan Collins	Republican	Deputy Maine Treasurer; gubernatorial nominee	1997	1952
3	Maryland	Barbara Mikulski	Democrat	Baltimore City Council, U.S. House of Representatives	1987	1936
1	Massachusetts	Elizabeth Warren	Democrat	Harvard University Law Professor, Special Adviser to the President for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau	2013	1949
1	Michigan	Debbie Stabenow	Democrat	Michigan House of Representatives, Michigan Senate, U.S. House of Representatives	2001	1950
1	Minnesota	Amy Klobuchar	Democratic-Farmer-Labor	Hennepin County Attorney	2007	1960
1	Missouri	Claire McCaskill	Democrat	Missouri House of Representatives, Jackson County Legislature, Jackson County, Missouri Prosecutor, State Auditor of Missouri	2007	1953
1	Nebraska	Deb Fischer	Republican	Nebraska Legislature	2013	1951
2	New Hampshire	Jeanne Shaheen	Democrat	New Hampshire Senate, Governor of New Hampshire	2009	1947
3	New Hampshire	Kelly Ayotte	Republican	New Hampshire Attorney General	2011	1968
1	New York	Kirsten Gillibrand	Democrat	U.S. House of Representatives	2009	1966
1	North Dakota	Heidi Heitkamp	Democrat	North Dakota Attorney General, North Dakota Tax Commissioner	2013	1955
3	Washington	Patty Murray	Democrat	Washington Senate	1993	1950
1	Washington	Maria Cantwell	Democrat	Washington House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives	2001	1958
2	West Virginia	Shelley Moore Capito	Republican	West Virginia House of Delegates, U.S. House of Representatives	2015	1953
1	Wisconsin	Tammy Baldwin	Democrat	Wisconsin State Assembly, U.S. House of Representatives	2013	1962

Election, selection and family

Before 2001, numerically speaking, the most common way for a woman to ascend to the U.S. Senate was to have been appointed there following the death or resignation of a husband or father who previously held the seat. An example is Muriel Humphrey (D-MN), the widow of former senator and Vice President Hubert Humphrey; she was appointed to fill his seat until a special election was held (in which she did not run). However, with the election of three women in 2000, the balance shifted: More women have now entered service as a senator by winning their seats outright than by being appointed to the body.

Recent examples of selection include Jean Carnahan and Lisa Murkowski. In 2000, Jean Carnahan (D-MO) was appointed to fill the Senate seat won by her recently deceased husband, Mel Carnahan. Carnahan—even though dead—defeated the incumbent senator, John Ashcroft. Carnahan's widow was named to fill his seat by Missouri Governor Roger Wilson until a special election was held. However, she lost the subsequent 2002 election to fill out the rest of the six-year term. In 2002, Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) was appointed by her father Alaska Governor Frank Murkowski, who had resigned from the Senate to become governor, to serve the remaining two years of his term. Lisa Murkowski defeated former governor Tony Knowles in her reelection bid in 2004.

Two recent members of the Senate brought with them a combination of name recognition resulting from the political careers of their famous husbands and their own substantial experience in public affairs. The first, former Senator Elizabeth Dole (R-NC), is married to former Senate Majority Leader and 1996 Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole and served as Secretary of Transportation under President Ronald Reagan and Secretary of Labor under President George H. W. Bush; she later ran a losing bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000. The other, former Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY), wife of former President Bill Clinton, was First Lady of the United States and First Lady of Arkansas before taking her seat in 2000. She too ran an unsuccessful campaign for her party's presidential nomination in 2008; she resigned in 2009 to become the secretary of state for the eventual victor of that election, Barack Obama.

Another famous name is Nancy Landon Kassebaum, the daughter of former Kansas governor and one-time presidential candidate Alf Landon. After retiring from the Senate, she married former Senator Howard Baker (R-TN). Kassebaum has the distinction of being the first female elected senator who did not succeed her husband in Congress (Margaret Chase Smith was only elected to the Senate after succeeding her husband to his House seat). At the time of her retirement in 1997, Kassebaum was the second longest serving female senator, after Smith (though now that five other women senators have since served longer tenures, she is now seventh).

Firsts and onlies

Senator Margaret Chase Smith (R-ME) holds several distinctions for women in the U.S. Congress: She served in the Senate for 24 years, longer than any other female senator until Barbara Mikulski eclipsed her record in 2011; she was the first woman ever elected to both the U.S. House and Senate (she was first elected to the House in 1940 after the unexpected death of her husband, who himself was a member of the House of Representatives, and she served there for eight years before winning the Senate seat by a landslide); she was the first woman to hold a Senate Leadership position; and she also won her 1960 race for Senate in the nation's first ever race pitting two women against each other for a Senate seat.

Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire holds the distinction of being the first woman elected both governor and senator of a state.

Houses served

Senator Olympia Snowe (R-ME) arrived in the Senate in 1995, having previously served in the House of Representatives and both houses of the Maine state legislature. She and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan are the only women to have served in both houses of a state legislature and both houses of the federal legislature.

Defeated incumbents

In 1992, Carol Moseley Braun (D-IL) became the first woman to defeat an incumbent senator when she toppled Senator Alan Dixon in the Democratic primary. Later that year, Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) was the first woman to defeat an incumbent senator from a different party when she defeated appointed Senator John Seymour in a special election. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) duplicated Feinstein's feat in 1993, toppling appointed Senator Bob Krueger in a special election. In 2000, Stabenow (D-MI) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) became the first women to defeat incumbent elected senators in a general election, unseating Senators Spencer Abraham and Slade Gorton respectively. In 2008, Kay Hagan became the first woman to unseat a female incumbent, Elizabeth Dole.

Senators from the same state

The first time two female senators from the same state served concurrently was Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer (both D-CA), both elected in 1992, with Feinstein taking office that same year (as the result of a special election) and Boxer taking office in 1993. For a brief time, there were two female senators from Kansas serving concurrently, when Nancy Kassebaum and Sheila Frahm briefly served together after Frahm's appointment in 1996; Frahm did not win election to the seat and left office later the same year. Maine Senators Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins served concurrently from 1997, when Collins entered office, to 2013, when Snowe retired. In Washington Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell have also served concurrently since 2001, when Cantwell entered office. Upon the opening of the 112th Congress, New Hampshire Democrat Jeanne Shaheen was joined by newly elected Republican Kelly Ayotte, making the first female tandem senators that do not belong to the same party.

List of states represented by women

This is a map of states that have been represented by women in the United States Senate.

  Democrat(s)

  Republican(s)

  Both a Democrat and a Republican

Eight Democratic women senators appear at the 2008 Democratic Convention in Denver. It has become a tradition at Democratic conventions for incumbent women senators to appear on opening night.

Twenty-seven states have been represented by female senators. In 2009, North Carolina became the first state to have been represented by female senators of both parties, and the first to have a female senator succeeded by a female senator from the other party. In 2011, New Hampshire became the second state to be represented by female senators from both parties, and the first to have female senators of both parties serving concurrently.

State	Current	Previous	Total
Alabama	0	2	2
Alaska	1	0	1
Arkansas	0	2	2
California	2	0	2
Florida	0	1	1
Georgia	0	1	1
Hawaii	1	0	1
Illinois	0	1	1
Iowa	1	0	1
Kansas	0	2	2
Louisiana	0	3	3
Maine	1	2	3
Maryland	1	0	1
Massachusetts	1	0	1
Michigan	1	0	1
Minnesota	1	1	2
Missouri	1	1	2
Nebraska	1	2	3
New Hampshire	2	0	2
New York	1	1	2
North Carolina	0	2	2
North Dakota	1	1	2
Oregon	0	1	1
South Dakota	0	2	2
Texas	0	1	1
Washington	2	0	2
West Virginia	1	0	1
Wisconsin	1	0	1

List of female senators

Senator	State	From	To	Length of service (days)	Entered the Senate	Reason for leaving	Party
Sen. Felton Rebecca Latimer Felton	Georgia	November 21, 1922	November 22, 1922	1	Appointment	Appointment ended	Democratic
Hattie Caraway	Arkansas	December 9, 1931	January 3, 1945	4,774	Appointment	Lost renomination	Democratic
Rose McConnell Long	Louisiana	January 31, 1936	January 2, 1937	337	Appointment	Appointment ended	Democratic
Dixie Bibb Graves	Alabama	August 20, 1937	January 10, 1938	143	Appointment	Appointment ended	Democratic
Gladys Pyle	South Dakota	November 9, 1938	January 3, 1939	55	Special election	Retired	Republican
Vera C. Bushfield	South Dakota	October 6, 1948	December 26, 1948	81	Appointment	Appointment ended	Republican
Margaret Chase Smith	Maine	January 3, 1949	January 3, 1973	8,766	Election	Lost re-election	Republican
Eva Kelly Bowring	Nebraska	April 16, 1954	November 7, 1954	205	Appointment	Appointment ended	Republican
Hazel Hampel Abel	Nebraska	November 8, 1954	December 31, 1954	53	Special election	Retired, and resigned early	Republican
Maurine Brown Neuberger	Oregon	November 9, 1960	January 3, 1967	2,246	Special election	Retired	Democratic
Elaine Edwards	Louisiana	August 1, 1972	November 13, 1972	104	Appointment	Appointment ended	Democratic
Muriel Humphrey	Minnesota	January 25, 1978	November 7, 1978	286	Appointment	Appointment ended	Democratic
Maryon Pittman Allen	Alabama	June 8, 1978	November 7, 1978	152	Appointment	Lost nomination to finish term	Democratic
Nancy Landon Kassebaum	Kansas	December 23, 1978	January 3, 1997	6,586	Election	Retired	Republican
Sen. Hawkins Paula Hawkins	Florida	January 1, 1981	January 3, 1987	2,193	Election	Lost re-election	Republican
Barbara Mikulski	Maryland	January 3, 1987	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Jocelyn Burdick	North Dakota	September 16, 1992	December 14, 1992	89	Appointment	Appointment ended	Democratic
Dianne Feinstein	California	November 10, 1992	Present		Special election	Incumbent	Democratic
Barbara Boxer	California	January 3, 1993	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Patty Murray	Washington	January 3, 1993	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Carol Moseley Braun	Illinois	January 3, 1993	January 3, 1999	2,191	Election	Lost re-election	Democratic
Sen. Hutchison Kay Bailey Hutchison	Texas	June 14, 1993	January 3, 2013	7,143	Special election	Retired	Republican
Olympia Snowe	Maine	January 3, 1995	January 3, 2013	6,575	Election	Retired	Republican
Sheila Frahm	Kansas	June 11, 1996	November 6, 1996	148	Appointment	Lost nomination to finish term	Republican
Susan Collins	Maine	January 3, 1997	Present		Election	Incumbent	Republican
Mary Landrieu	Louisiana	January 3, 1997	January 3, 2015	6,575	Election	Lost re-election	Democratic
Blanche Lincoln	Arkansas	January 3, 1999	January 3, 2011	4,383	Election	Lost re-election	Democratic
Maria Cantwell	Washington	January 3, 2001	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Jean Carnahan	Missouri	January 3, 2001	November 25, 2002	691	Appointment	Lost election to finish term	Democratic
Hillary Rodham Clinton	New York	January 3, 2001	January 21, 2009	2,940	Election	Resigned to become United States Secretary of State	Democratic
Debbie Stabenow	Michigan	January 3, 2001	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Lisa Murkowski	Alaska	December 20, 2002	Present		Appointment	Incumbent	Republican
Elizabeth Dole	North Carolina	January 3, 2003	January 3, 2009	2,192	Election	Lost re-election	Republican
Amy Klobuchar	Minnesota	January 3, 2007	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Claire McCaskill	Missouri	January 3, 2007	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Jeanne Shaheen	New Hampshire	January 3, 2009	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Kirsten Gillibrand	New York	January 26, 2009	Present		Appointment	Incumbent	Democratic
Kay Hagan	North Carolina	January 3, 2009	January 3, 2015	2,191	Election	Lost re-election	Democratic
Sen. Ayotte Kelly Ayotte	New Hampshire	January 3, 2011	Present		Election	Incumbent	Republican
Tammy Baldwin	Wisconsin	January 3, 2013	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Deb Fischer	Nebraska	January 3, 2013	Present		Election	Incumbent	Republican
Heidi Heitkamp	North Dakota	January 3, 2013	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Mazie Hirono	Hawaii	January 3, 2013	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Elizabeth Warren	Massachusetts	January 3, 2013	Present		Election	Incumbent	Democratic
Shelley Moore Capito	West Virginia	January 3, 2015	Present		Election	Incumbent	Republican
Joni Ernst	Iowa	January 3, 2015	Present		Election	Incumbent	Republican

Graphs

Histograph

Starting	Total	Graph
March 4, 1789	0
November 21, 1922	1	*
November 23, 1922	0
December 9, 1931	1	*
January 31, 1936	2	**
January 3, 1937	1	*
August 20, 1937	2	**
January 11, 1938	1	*
November 9, 1938	2	**
January 4, 1939	1	*
January 4, 1945	0
October 6, 1948	1	*
December 27, 1948	0
January 3, 1949	1	*
April 16, 1954	2	**
January 1, 1955	1	*
November 9, 1960	2	**
January 4, 1967	1	*
August 1, 1972	2	**
November 14, 1972	1	*
January 4, 1973	0
January 25, 1978	1	*
June 8, 1978	2	**
November 8, 1978	0
December 23, 1978	1	*
January 1, 1981	2	**
September 16, 1992	3	***
November 10, 1992	4	****
December 15, 1992	3	***
January 3, 1993	6	******
June 14, 1993	7	*******
January 3, 1995	8	********
June 11, 1996	9	*********
November 7, 1996	8	********
January 3, 1997	9	*********
January 3, 2001	13	*************
November 26, 2002	12	************
December 20, 2002	13	*************
January 3, 2003	14	**************
January 3, 2007	16	****************
January 3, 2009	17	*****************
January 22, 2009	16	****************
January 26, 2009	17	*****************
January 3, 2013	20	********************
January 3, 2015	20	********************

Time series

See also

• Women in the United States House of Representatives
• Widow's succession

External links

• U.S. Senate History: Women in the Senate
• "Women in the U.S. Senate 1922-2010" Center for American Women and Politics, Eagleton Institute of Politics, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey